


Mrs Hudson's House of Sweets

by KitsJay



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Bakery!AU, M/M, Mrs Hudson is an evil genius, kinkmeme fill, university!au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-30
Updated: 2014-01-22
Packaged: 2018-01-03 00:31:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 8,867
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1063537
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KitsJay/pseuds/KitsJay
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes when funds get really tight, Sherlock and John work for Mrs Hudson down in her little sandwich store/bakery/corner shop. *Edit: There was a chapter missing that I just now noticed, so it's been added and fixed. Sorry!</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

"Don't you have an exam tomorrow?" John asked, watching his flatmate idly click through Yahoo! Answers, telling commenters how very wrong they were. He never bothered to leave the correct answer, John noticed, just pointed out the flaws in the ones offered.

"Mmm," Sherlock hummed non-committedly, eviscerating another poor Internet soul.

"Isn't it half of your grade?"

Sherlock shrugged, putting the finishing touches on his reply, which included adding links to job applications at nearby fast-food chains.

John sighed, pulling on his coat. "I'm off to work. You know that Mrs Hudson offered to give you a job if you wanted one?"

"I have far better things to do than make pastries for the unwashed masses, thanks all the same," Sherlock said cuttingly.

Rolling his eyes, John slammed the door of their flat on their way out. If someone had told him four years ago when he started uni that he'd be living in a cheap flat with a student who only seldom went to classes, almost never did any homework, and still managed to beat John on every one of his exams... well, he would have believed them, if they told him that his flatmate's name was Sherlock Holmes.

 

Mrs Hudson, who was both their landlady and John's employer, had tsked when she had first heard their plight, immediately offering John a job when he had admitted to being late on the rent because of financial difficulties. School took up most of his time and outside jobs were hard to find, at least ones that worked well with his schedule. Thankfully the little pastry shop that Mrs Hudson ran around the corner was open at odd hours--most of her best business came around the end of the year, when insomniac students wandered in, clothes rumpled after having been slept in for three days, hair a mess, and stomachs rebelling against a pure caffeine diet--and she herself was wonderfully sympathetic to John's predicament.

She had offered Sherlock a job, as well, but the gangly young man had turned his lip up, thanked her for her generous offer, and explained that his brother, Mycroft, took care of all his expenses.

John mused on this, tying the plain white apron around his waist as he got ready to take over the counter. Mrs Hudson spent most of her time in the back, singing sweetly off-key as she rolled out dough, tossed pans into the oven, and turned out the best scones, biscuits, and cakes around. Along with the pittance John made working at the shop, she would sneak him platefuls of whatever was left at the end of the day, patting him on the cheek and telling him that if he didn't take them, she would just have to throw them out anyway and wouldn't that be a waste, there's a dear.

He shrugged, pasting on a broad, fake smile as the first customer wandered in.

"What can I do for you today?" he asked, gritting his teeth as the customer hemmed and hawed indecisively over a large, pink monstrosity of a cake and an assortment of brownies. A few more years, he reminded himself, then he would be a doctor and working a proper job, with a title and respect.

When half of your day was spent listening to professors drone on, a fourth with an eccentric flatmate who seemed to do nothing at all except make John's life miserable, and the last bit burning your fingers on the edges of hot pans and bundling up sweets for ungrateful customers, a few years can seem like an awful long time.


	2. Chapter 2

John’s shift ended after what seemed an interminably long time, though really it was only four hours, and as expected, Mrs Hudson had slipped him a few biscuits wrapped up in cellophane, tied together with a ribbon. He thanked her, pecked her on the cheek, and wandered up to his flat, feeling bone-tired already. He had a paper due in one of his classes that he had not even looked at in a week, some daily work that was supposed to have been done two weeks ago, and an exam to look forward to next Wednesday. Predictably, Sherlock chose this time to meet him at the door, eyes wild, hair sticking up more than usual.

“Travesty has struck,” Sherlock said with his usual flair for the dramatic.

“Yes? Failed your exam, have you?” Though John didn’t usually consider himself a mean-spirited person, he did occasionally in a very petty place in his heart wish that Sherlock would fail an exam, so that he would appreciate the amount of work normal people had to put into schooling. As yet, the closest he had come was when he was forced to take a basic astronomy class, which John had helpfully tutored him through most of.

“No, worse,” Sherlock said, plucking at his sleeves nervously. “Mycroft called.”

“And?”

“He’s cut me off,” Sherlock said with dismay, as if he could not even fathom the possibility. “He somehow managed to wrangle a look at my records.”

“I didn’t think—those are supposed to be sealed,” John said, frowning.

Sherlock shot him a familiar look, one that said John was being painfully idiotic in some new and unexciting way. “Mycroft has his ways,” he explained cryptically. “He refuses to accept my degree.”

“Which is?” John said, often wondering. The classes Sherlock took seemed to be a motley olio of courses which bore no apparent link to one another.

“I made my own,” Sherlock waved his hand dismissively in the air.

John stared at him. “I didn’t know you could do that,” he said finally, though really, it should not have surprised him in the least that Sherlock would find a way.

“Clearly, you can. But Mycroft,” Sherlock sneered at his brother’s name, “has said that my degree is worthless and refuses to fund it unless I take ‘real’ courses.”

“How very awful for you,” John said, not feeling sympathetic in the slightest. “Whatever shall you do, now that you’re one of the unwashed masses?”

Sherlock stopped, affronted at the insult. “I will never be one of the unwashed masses.”

“You could always work at the pastry shop,” John reminded him.

Sherlock tossed his head, hair flipping around him in a way that was entirely not like a model. “Never. How hard can it be to find a job?”

John blinked once, twice, opened his mouth, shut it again. He debated telling Sherlock about how hard it was to submit application upon application, finding you didn’t have enough experience for your employer, interviewing and hoping that the person didn’t ask you something dreadfully obscure, finding that the position had already been filled by somebody’s nephew, and starting anew. Debated, but decided against it. The telly had been out for a month, the bill unpaid amidst a stack of others that Sherlock forgot to pay and John didn’t have the money to, and John could use some entertainment, even if it was at the expense of his often irritating flatmate.

 _Especially_ if it was the expense of his flatmate.

After a week, John nodding with false sympathy as Sherlock railed against the idiots he encountered on a daily basis during his Search for a Proper Job, his brother for cutting him off, the world for not being brilliant enough to handle him, Sherlock gave in.

“I can’t believe he wouldn’t hire me,” Sherlock said, curled up on the couch. John had his laptop on his lap and patted Sherlock’s head absent-mindedly. It was rather like having a particularly aloof, ambivalent cat who only paid attention to John when he stopped to complain bitterly that John had forgotten to feed him. Actually, that described pretty much all cats, so never mind, it was exactly like having a cat. An overgrown one named Sherlock.

“Perhaps you shouldn’t have said that he was sleeping with the boss’s daughter,” John said. He tilted his head in consideration. “Particularly not when the boss was in the room.”

“Anyone could have figured it out,” Sherlock moaned indignantly. He butted his head up against John’s hand again, who rolled his eyes and soothingly stroked through the dark mess. There was a reason he couldn’t get a date, John thought darkly. Every time he came close, Sherlock would do the equivalent of making his hair stand up and hissing, marking his territory until the poor bloke or girl ran off, then Sherlock would go back to ignoring John again. John was under no illusions that this meant his flatmate actually was interested in John; he was just a petulant toddler who didn’t like to share his toys. The closest John had gotten to getting laid recently was the girl in his biology class, who spent the entire time texting on her Blackberry and whose name may or may not have been Anthea. Or Althea. He couldn’t really tell, and the last time he tried talking to her, she had stared at him blankly and asked him who he was.

“There’s always the pastry shop,” John said for the fortieth time. Rent was due soon and Mrs Hudson’s patience only went so far. Granted, it seemed to go much farther for Sherlock than it would anyone else—she had even forgiven him the unfortunate incident with the microwave and the jar of mayonnaise—but it wasn’t infinite.

Instead of the immediate negative response he had come to expect, however, there was silence. John’s hand stilled in the mass of curls. “Sherlock?”

“How much does it pay?”

John wondered briefly, as he recited the pay and the hours and the responsibilities to Sherlock, if this was entirely a good idea. That thought would later occur to him. Much, much later. So much later, in fact, that it might even be considered by some to be _too_ late.


	3. Chapter 3

Sherlock’s first day at the shop was doomed from the start. He had taken one look at the apron and outright refused. For someone who considered his body to be nothing more than transport, he was horribly finicky about what he put on it. John had seldom seen the man not perfectly dressed, as if he were going to a fashion shoot and not just to class or around the corner to Tesco’s.

Mrs Hudson had said that John had more experience, and they had both privately agreed that Sherlock was never to be allowed near anything that could potentially explode, and so would work in the back while Sherlock dealt with the customers. In theory, this was a good, solid divvying up of responsibilities. In reality, it was an utter disaster.

John hadn’t been in the back more than ten minutes when he first heard the raised voices. Alarmed, he grabbed a nearby towel to wipe off the worst of the flour decorating his forearms, and popped his head up front.

Sherlock was facing off with a customer over the register.

“What’s going on here?” John asked cautiously, stepping up to the counter.

“I want this man _fired_ ,” the customer said angrily. Her face was flushed a dull red with anger, hands clenched in fists by her side.

“I’m sure there’s just been a misunderstanding,” John said with an apologetic smile. He grabbed Sherlock’s arm and towed him a safe distance from the counter, dropping the smile. “What did you do?”

“Why is it my fault?” Sherlock protested. “All I said was that she would be better served finding a new husband rather than eating away her sorrows in sweets over the last.”

“Oh, is that all?” John said disbelievingly.

Sherlock coughed delicately. “I may have also inadvertently mentioned that he was cheating on her with his secretary well before he served her the divorce papers.”

Covering his face with one hand, John pointed to the ground with the other. “Stay here while I clean this mess up.”

Turning to the woman who was still quivering with rage and, John noted, trying desperately not to cry, John gave her a sympathetic look. “I’m so sorry about that, ma’am. He’s not very good with people.”

“But why’d he have to say that about Tommy?” the woman’s lower lip trembled. She sniffed, covering her mouth with one hand and sobbing loudly into it. Helplessly, John passed her a tissue and guided her to a seat, patting her shoulder consolingly and shooting glares at Sherlock. After gifting her with some biscuits which were not so much free as they were paid for out of John’s pocket, the woman left, still crying.

Sherlock, for his part, leaned over the counter, flipping idly through his chemistry textbook and looking for all the world like an innocent bystander in the whole affair.

After the woman had left, John whirled on his friend, flatmate, and now co-worker.

“What was that about?”

Sherlock finished writing, “WRONG” in the margins of his book before giving John an innocent look. “What do you mean?”

“If you think that’s going to get you out of working the front, you can forget it,” John said, gratified when Sherlock’s expression filtered through a moment of shock before settling into sullen. “Mrs Hudson is coming in soon and so you’d best not do that again, or else she’ll fire you on the spot.”

The threat was an idle one, they both knew it, but it was the best John could come up with at the moment. He returned to the back, leaving a small cloud of flour behind as he did so.

He heard the door chime a few minutes later as he was in the middle of kneading a ball of dough, then the quiet murmur of conversation. Sherlock poked his head through.

“Have we got any snickerdoodles?”

“What?”

“Sugar cookies with cinnamon on top.”

“No,” John said. “Tell whoever it is that we can make some if they want to wait.”

“Right.”

Sherlock disappeared, only to reappear a moment later. “She wants to know how long that would take.”

John sighed. “Um, about half an hour.”

The door swung shut again, and John internally counted down. He had just reached thirteen when Sherlock popped in again. “She says that’s too long. Can she leave and come back?”

“Yes,” John said exasperatedly. “And you know this, I know you do. Stop hoping that bothering me will get you out of it, because it won’t.”

The door had closed before he had even finished the sentence. He went back to kneading the dough, throwing his annoyance into punching it flat and beginning again, folding it and pounding it with his fists.

The door chimed again as another customer must have walked in. There was more quiet conversation, then suddenly an ominous silence. John managed to wait a full ten seconds before grabbing the towel and going to the front yet again.

A startlingly good looking young man leaned against the counter, dark hair falling forward into his face appealingly. The man had his hands braced on either side of the register, practically snarling, exposing slightly uneven teeth. John’s breath caught and he coughed to clear his throat.

“Can I help you?”

“You can tell him that he’d better watch his mouth,” the man said, gesturing to Sherlock, who was inspecting the glass display with undue interest.

“I’m sorry for whatever he may have said,” John apologised, not even bothering to ask what it was that had gotten him so riled. Morbid curiosity would have to wait. “He gets like that when he hasn’t had his nap.”

Sherlock’s head shot up and he opened his mouth to protest, but the customer’s warm laugh interrupted it. John felt his face flush with pleasure as the man stuck out his hand.

“Greg,” he said. “Greg Lestrade.”

John wiped off the flour on his hands discreetly on his apron, offering his own and shaking the calloused palm. “John Watson.”

“You look familiar, have I seen you before?” Greg squinted at him.

“Do you go to uni here?”

“Yeah, that’s where I know you from,” Greg said, snapping his fingers. “I’ve seen you in class. We had that batty old woman for Literature together.”

John’s eyes lit up in recognition. The young man had been quiet in the back of the class, barely noticeable, but John remembered sneaking peeks at him, feeling like a schoolgirl who drew her crush’s name on her paper, decorating it with tiny hearts floating around it. “Good memory.”

“You broke your ankle or something and came to class with a cane,” Greg said aloud. “Got better?”

“Yeah, much, thanks,” John said.

Sherlock harrumphed from the corner, drawing their attention back to him. “Touching. Can you please order and leave?”

“Sherlock!” John scolded him. He turned to Greg again, smiling genuinely. “Sorry about him.”

“No problem. He was like that in bio class, too, if I remember. Gave the teacher fits.”

Sherlock peered at him. “I remember you,” he suddenly announced. “Did you pass that class or did you just cheat off of Sally’s homework?”

“I just need a dozen oatmeal raisins,” he told John, ignoring Sherlock entirely.

“Sure,” John said, bending to retrieve them from the display. Deliberately casual, he asked, “For your girlfriend?”

Sherlock’s eyebrow raised in a way that said he knew exactly what John was doing and John shook his head viciously. There would be no marking of territory today, thank you very much.

Greg laughed. “Oh, God, no. Just going home for holiday. My mum loves them and I figured I need something to break the bad news to her.”

“Bad news?” John asked, passing the biscuits to Sherlock and indicating with a stern look that he was to package them. Sherlock grumbled a bit, but did so.

“I’m switching degrees,” Greg said ruefully. “Mum wanted me to be a solicitor, but it’s too after the fact for me."

“So what are you doing now?” John said, not even having to feign interest. It helped that Greg was absolutely captivating without even appearing to know it.

“I want to be a copper,” Greg said with a shrug. “I always have, but mum insisted I at least try my hand at law. It’s fine, I’m just not cut out for it.”

The box of biscuits hit the counter with a dull thump.

“There you go,” Sherlock said with a fake smile. “Best of luck at the vocation change.”

“Thanks,” Greg said grudgingly. He flashed a smile at John. “Take care.”

“You too,” John waved him out. He turned to Sherlock and crossed his arms, staring at him accusingly.

“Yes?”

“ ‘Best of luck’?” John parroted him. “You’re never that nice.”

“He’ll need it,” Sherlock said sourly. “He was absolutely terrible in class. I’d be surprised if he knew the difference between eukaryote and prokaryote without dear Sally Donovan explaining it to him.”

“I hate you sometimes,” John announced. “I really, really do.”

Sherlock looked perversely pleased at the sentiment. “Thank you.”

Mrs Hudson showed up and went to work, busily whipping up her culinary masterpieces in the kitchen area while Sherlock managed to alienate, offend, or insult most of the customers. After the third stormed out, loudly vowing to report the shop to the Offices of Trading Standards, Mrs Hudson had tutted and switched John to the front and brought Sherlock to the back, despite John’s misgivings about Sherlock being allowed around anything that would be used to produce something edible.

“He’ll be fine, dear,” Mrs Hudson had assured him, ushering him to the front.

The first batch that came out was immediately thrown into the bin. The second was burnt to a crisp, looking like it had gone through the center of Hell and back. It joined the first. The third looked edible, but the first customer had taken one bite and cried out something about his tooth being chipped.

“Oh, Sherlock,” Mrs Hudson shook her head. “What a mess you’ve made.”

Sherlock, for his part, looked mostly smug beneath a put-on expression of dismay.

“I really tried with that batch,” he told Mrs Hudson earnestly. His face cleared and he clapped his hands. “Well, I suppose this didn’t work out. I’ll just have to work up front.”

He was halfway to the door when Mrs Hudson caught his arm with a smile that John had once seen on a nature documentary during Sherlock’s “Shark Week” phase.

“Oh, no, dearie,” she said, patting his arm. “You’ll never learn that way. I’ll just sit here and watch you make them until you get it right.”

Sherlock shot a panicked look at John, who just smiled and let the door close. It would serve him right.

The next batches came out flawlessly under Mrs Hudson’s sharp eye, Sherlock resentfully putting his chemistry knowledge to good use as he carefully measured out the ingredients and determined the perfect temperature and time for baking the perfect biscuit. Even John had to admit, taking a bite out of one of the sugary confections, that he had a hidden talent for it. He still wouldn’t trust him to make anything for dinner, but apparently even the great Sherlock Holmes was scared of Mrs Hudson’s grandmotherly façade. Now that he had resigned himself to his fate, he showed a prowess and almost obsessiveness with baking, toying with the mixtures and adding a hint of cinnamon in this, or a dash of nutmeg in that, until Mrs Hudson beamed with pleasure. At the end of their shift, Sherlock was flushed, his hair turned grey under a cloud of flour, and his apron covered with various stains.

Mrs Hudson slipped them both a bag of biscuits as they said goodbye and walked home.


	4. Chapter 4

The weeks flew by, most of their younger customers disappearing home after exams. Even Sherlock grew bored with tinkering with the recipes and now mostly sat in the back, legs propped up on one of the ovens as he read.

John propped his head up with one elbow on the counter, alternating between sparing vacantly into space and watching the clock on the wall, willing it to go faster.

The door chimed and he straightened.

“Hello, how can I—“ He stopped as he realised who it was, then smiled with genuine delight. “Greg! How are you?”

“Good,” Greg said with a smile. “Just back from holiday.”

“How’d your mum take the news?”

“Pretty well, considering,” Greg said, lifting one shoulder in a shrug. “It helped that my sister went and got herself pregnant. My problems kind of paled in comparison.”

Sherlock, hearing the conversation, joined them at the front.

“Lestrade,” he said stiffly, nodding his head.

“Holmes,” Greg shot back.

“What can we do for you?” John asked.

“I need two dozen shortbreads.”

“I’m afraid we’re all out,” John said apologetically. “Do you mind waiting?”

“We’re not out,” Sherlock interrupted, his brow wrinkling. “We have some in the back.”

“Those are old,” John lied desperately.

“They’re not old,” said Sherlock. “You made them—“

“Sherlock!” John bit out between gritted teeth, willing his flatmate to catch on. “Just make some new ones, will you?”

Greg was smirking and John wanted to hide behind the counter with embarrassment. Sherlock just sniffed, disappearing into the kitchen, which had become his domain ever since he discovered Mrs Hudson’s hidden stubborn streak.

“Sorry about that,” John said, turning to Greg again. “It’ll be a bit of a wait, I’m afraid.”

“No problem. Would you care to join me?” he gestured to the small café style chairs dotting the open area.

“Sure,” John pounced on the opportunity. “I’ll just take a break. Want some tea while we wait?”

“That’d be great.”

John popped his head into the back, spotting Sherlock looking for all the world like a mad scientist, meting out the perfect amount of butter for the biscuits to crumble in the oven. “Sherlock, I’m taking a bit of a break, okay?”

“Mm.”

“Sherlock, are you paying attention? You’ll have to handle any new customers for the next twenty minutes,” John said, pouring two cups of tea and grabbing some sugar and cream just in case.

“Right,” Sherlock waved his hand without looking at John. “Go. Enjoy your mating ritual. You can do much better, by the way."

John just rolled his eyes and joined Greg at the table with the tea. “So, where were we?”

“We were just at the point where you admitted that you’re terrible at flirting and I said I thought it was cute and asked you out,” Greg said calmly, ignoring the flush crawling up John’s neck and settling on his cheeks. “So, how about it? Say tomorrow, eight o’clock?”

John cleared his throat. “Eight sounds lovely.”

“Good. Now how about you tell me how you came to work with such a complete tosser?”  
“He’s not that bad,” John said weakly. At Greg’s raised eyebrow, he admitted, “Alright, he is that bad, but you get used to it. I actually share a flat with him just around the corner, 221 B.”

“That’s… horrifying,” Greg said with a wince. He took a sip of his tea and added some more sugar to it.

“It’s not too awful,” John shook his head, defending his friend. “He’s just a tad on the eccentric side. Brilliant, but eccentric.”

“I remember,” Greg said with a commiserating smile. “I wasn’t kidding when I said he gave the instructor fits. I think at one point he made the poor man cry.”

“That sounds like him.”

“So what are you studying, John?”

“Medicine,” John told him.

“Going to be a doctor?” Greg seemed impressed. “Is that something your parents pushed you into?”

“No, not really,” John said, musing on it. “I mean, they were happy, of course, but they aren’t the type to push me into anything. And besides which, my sister, Harry, dropped out of uni and went kind of wild, so anything I do is fine by them in comparison. But I’ve always wanted to be a doctor, as long as I can remember.”

“Don’t take this the wrong way,” Greg said hesitantly, as if he were unsure how what he was about to say would be received, “but you seem like the type who really cares about people. Sorry. That’s creepy, right, because we don’t really know each other?”

John felt a warm rush of pleasure in the pit of his stomach and he looked down into his tea. “No,” he mumbled. “Not creepy at all.”

“The biscuits are ready,” Sherlock said with theatrical flair. He placed the box on the counter and stood, waiting for Greg to collect them and leave. John could almost hear the growling and hissing from here. If he craned his neck, he was sure he would be able to see a tail swishing angrily from behind his jealous flat mate.

Greg rolled his eyes, but slipped a piece of paper into John’s hands. “My number, just in case,” he told him. “Remember, eight o’clock tomorrow.”

“I won’t forget,” John said, collecting the two cups and standing. Greg grinned, then seemingly on a whim, leaned forward and gave John a peck on his cheek before disappearing out the door with a cheeky wave. John stood in the centre of the room, the two cups forgotten in his hands, and smiled like an idiot. Despite Sherlock’s disdainful look and running commentary on Greg’s intelligence, John found himself smiling like that the rest of his shift.

 

The next day couldn't come fast enough, but an hour before his date, John wished that time would slow down. He went through his closet, discarding clothes right and left as he tried to find the perfect attire. Sherlock sat cross-legged on his bed, occasionally looking up and offering commentary on John's choices.

"No, no, definitely not, why do you even own that?" With a sigh of despair, Sherlock set aside his beloved laptop and pushed John out of the way, sifting through his wardrobe. "Don't you own anything but jumpers and checkered shirts?"

On the verge of giving up, Sherlock finally unearthed a plain blue button-up and a pair of charcoal trousers. He shoved them into John's arms and ordered him to try them on, giving an approving nod when John reappeared wearing the outfit.

"Much better," Sherlock said with an assessing eye. "Though why I'm helping you on this I will never understand."

"Because you're my friend and you're trying to remind me why I don't want to kill you."

"The maintenance man said the heating would be back in no time," Sherlock said, though even he sounded a little sheepish. "Besides, if you really wanted my advice--"

"No, I don't want to hear it," John said. He grabbed his keys and phone, checking to make sure he had everything he needed. There was a knock at the door and he met Sherlock's eyes, suddenly feeling a little nauseous. John was a friendly bloke, loved to date, but he never got over that feeling of butterflies and nervousness that preceded the first date. Sherlock seemed to sense this and helpfully opened the door and shoved him outside into the hallway where Greg was waiting.

"Hi," John said, regaining his balance.

"Hi," Greg said with an amused smile. "Ready to go?"

John smiled, his anxiety easing under Greg's careless ease. "Ready."  
Their date went extraordinarily well. Greg was warm, friendly, with a slight air of rebelliousness that John in all honesty found intriguing. He was funny, too, sharing John’s quirky sense of humour and laughing openly when John slipped in his own joke or too.

They went and saw a movie, then retired to a small pub frequented mainly by students and shared a meal, talking about the terrible acting and the atrocious plot. The conversation stalled occasionally, as it so often did during first dates, each wondering what to say and how to say it, but quickly picked up again over their plate of chips. At the end of the night, Greg walked with him back to the flat. He looked nervous for the first time all night, and John hid a smile.

“I had a good time,” John offered.

Greg ran a hand through his hair, looking down at his shoes. “Me, too. Do you want to go out again? Sometime next week?”

“Sounds great.”

There was an awkward pause, then John took a step forward, grabbing the lapels of Greg’s jacket and shoving him against the wall, meeting his lips with reckless abandon. Greg made a small noise of surprise, then his hands settled on John’s shoulders, pulling him closer to his body. John nipped at Greg’s lower lip, slipping his tongue in when the other man’s mouth opened invitingly. Their tongues met and John had to remind himself to pull back before it went too far. The kiss softened into something almost sweet, both of them reluctant to break apart. John finally gathered his will power and took a step back, breathing heavily. Greg looked dazed and rumpled, leaning against the wall as if it were the only thing holding him up at this point.

“Uh,” he said eloquently. He gave a small cough. “That was, um. Unexpected.”

“When I want something, I go for it.” He straightened his shirt, knowing that it was useless and within minutes of walking into the flat, Sherlock would immediately know how the date went, but feeling like some decorum was called for nonetheless. He smiled at Greg. “See you next week?”

He was gratified to see that Greg’s eyes were still a little unfocussed. “Right. Next week.”

“Night,” John said, opening the door and entering the flat. As soon as the door had shut, he leaned against the wall, laughing with one hand over his eyes.

“What’s so funny?” Sherlock’s voice asked. John looked up to see his friend peering at him curiously over the sofa.

“I just can’t believe I did something,” John waved him off. “How was your night?”

Sherlock’s sharp eyes roamed over him. “Not as good as yours, clearly, though more productive.”

“Finally got that essay done?”

“Yes. Well, in a manner. I wrote him an essay of equal length to that of the requirements explaining why it was an asinine project in the first place.”

“Good luck with that,” John said, too high from his date to even chastise Sherlock.

He wandered into his room and shut the door, getting ready for bed and laughing around a mouthful of toothpaste.

“When I want something, I go for it?” he said into the mirror. “I can’t believe I said that.”

He paused. “I can’t believe that worked.”

Shaking his head, he crawled into bed, wishing that next week would get here sooner.

The next few days he had off from work, but Thursday he was slated to work alongside Sherlock once again. He came into the shop, nodding a hello at Mrs Hudson, and putting on his apron.

“Has it been busy?” he asked.

Sherlock looked up. “Not really. I think most of the regulars know when my schedule is and actively avoid me now.”

“That isn’t a good thing,” John reminded him, counting the till. “Does Mrs Hudson know?”

“How do you think they found out?”

“Made anyone cry today?” John asked.

“Only one,” Sherlock shrugged. He was halfway through his homework, John was pleased to see. The only time Sherlock did his homework was when he was bored. If anything, the work at the shop had probably sent his instructors, who despaired of the brilliant, recalcitrant young man, into throes of ecstasy.

“Good to know.”

The day went by quickly, the regulars indeed having memorised Sherlock’s schedule and accordingly shifting their normal route to come in during John’s. He didn’t even mind the extra work when a familiar face appeared, waiting for the worst of the crowd to disperse.

“Have time for a quick break?” Greg asked, offering John a cup of coffee.

“Uh,” John looked at the clock, then at Mrs Hudson, who gave him a conspiratorial wink and a knowing smile before shooing him out the door and taking over at the register.

They wound up out behind the building, leaning against the crumbling bricks. Greg pulled out a fag, offering one to John, who shook his head disapprovingly. Shrugging, Greg lit one and took a deep breath, blowing out the smoke with a groan of pleasure.

“Those will kill you, you know,” John pointed out. He didn’t mind much, and honestly it was probably healthier than Sherlock’s disquieting habit of putting three nicotine patches on his arm at a time, despite John’s constant reminder that they were not supposed to be used like that. Besides, he himself had stolen a smoke or two, most often around exam time when any excuse for a study break was a welcome one.

“Probably,” Greg said with a smile, taking another drag. “But at least I’ll die happy.”

Greg finished it, stubbing the end out beneath his toe, then grabbed John’s arm and pulled him closer in. John braced his legs to accommodate Greg’s thigh in between his own and settled his hands on Greg’s hips. Their mouths met, Greg’s tasting faintly of ash and coffee. It sent a thrill of illicit pleasure up and down John’s spine, like he was a teenager making out with Amy Ferstadt behind the school. He had to break the kiss because of his sudden smile, laughing softly into Greg’s neck.

“What’s so funny?”

“Nothing,” John said, craning back up to kiss Greg again. “Just thought of something.”

“If you’re thinking, then I must be doing something wrong.”

“No,” another kiss, “you’re doing everything exactly right.”


	5. Chapter 5

He really should have known better, John thought. It had been going so well. Too well. There had been the second date, the third date, the fourth, then it had somehow reached that point where instead of counting the dates, they counted how long it had been, with only the pettiest of fights.

Then there had been tonight.

He and Greg were at Greg’s flat, watching a film, though it was more of a film playing in the background while they laid on the couch together, Greg braced over John’s body as he kissed his way down his neck and tugged off his jumper. Both of them were panting and shirtless, hands roving over the exposed skin. John wrapped his arms around Greg’s neck and tugged him down, thrusting his hips up, his own groan mixing with Greg’s lower one. Greg tucked his face into John’s neck, planting an open-mouthed kiss at the juncture of his shoulder and neck, one hand busily working to undo John’s belt. He had just pried it loose and opened the front of John’s trousers when John’s mobile buzzed.

They paused for a moment before silently deciding to ignore it, when it began to ring insistently. Greg dropped his head onto John’s shoulder.

“You know it’s Sherlock,” he said, his voice muffled into John’s skin. John ran a hand through Greg’s hair.

“I know.”

“But you’re going to answer it anyway.”

Even though he knew it was going to cause trouble, John found himself defending Sherlock. “It might be something important.”

Greg jumped up with a groan that was definitely not like the ones he had been giving a moment before. “It won’t be!” he said with frustration. “It’ll be, ‘I forgot where we keep the tea’, or, ‘I need someone to go get me some milk.’ Honestly, John, I don’t know why you put up with it.”

“He’s my friend,” John said, buttoning up his trousers. The mobile continued blithely on, cheerfully ignorant of the friction it had caused. “I can’t just ignore him.”

“Yes, you can. It’s easy, watch.” Greg snatched up the mobile before John could protest, flipping it open. He didn’t even put it up to his ear, just held it in front of him as he shouted, “Sod off!” into the receiver.

John grabbed the phone from him as he pulled on his jumper, then redialed Sherlock’s number and waited for it to ring. He glared at Greg and stalked to the door of Greg's flat angrily.

“Take your own advice, Greg,” he said, slamming the door behind him.

John sat on the couch, staring at the wall in front of him and simultaneously hoping Greg would ring and hating himself for wanting him to. God, he thought disgustedly to himself, he was a teenage girl. Any minute now he would start listening to break-up songs and write abominable poetry on his blog.

His flat mate had disappeared as soon as John had come home, somehow sensing something was amiss, despite his cluelessness to most anything emotional in nature. John was torn between wanting his friend here to take his mind off the fight and wanting him here so that he could blame him for beginning the fight in the first place. It wasn’t fair, he knew, it was just Sherlock being Sherlock. Yes, the man could learn the niceties of social convention, but he wasn’t likely to, and John knew hoping that one day he would suddenly decide they were worth learning was as improbable as John deciding to become a showgirl in America. Greg knew it, too, which was part of the reason John kept having to push down the surges of anger whenever he thought about it. How dare he try to get him to choose between his boyfriend and his friend! How dare he steal John’s mobile! How dare he make John sit wallowing in self-pity in the darkened living room of his flat, thinking things like ‘How dare he’ unironically!

The door opened softly, like whoever was entering wasn’t sure if he was welcome or not. John leaned his head back against the back of the sofa, eyes closed. A weight settled in next to him, then the sound of someone clearing his throat interrupted his depressing thoughts.

“What is it, Sherlock?” John asked tiredly.

“I brought you this,” Sherlock said. John opened his eyes and found Sherlock offering him a bag filled with two rented films of the chick-flick variety, a container of ice cream, and what looked to be a bottle of liquor.

“What is this?” he said, not even bothering to guess.

Sherlock looked affronted, then unsure. “It’s break-up things,” he said finally. “I have it on good authority that this is what friends are supposed to do when the other breaks up.”

“By good authority you mean the Internet, don’t you?” John asked. Sherlock looked trapped, which did more to confirm John’s guess than if he had admitted it. “And you do realise these are for girl break-ups, don’t you?”

“I was afraid of that,” Sherlock muttered. “There’s very little data on what to do when a male breaks up with another male.”

John found himself laughing despite himself. “Thanks anyway,” he said sincerely.

Sherlock nodded, clearly a little crest-fallen that his experiment hadn’t worked, and John felt almost sorry for him. Most people, even Greg, only saw the caustic exterior of the man, and to be fair, that was most of his interior as well. But there were flashes of genuine humanity, the occasional glimpse of a person who wanted to be part of the unwashed masses but honestly had no idea how to go about it.

“Come here,” John said, tugging Sherlock closer to him. The other man curled up, feline-like, on the couch, his head near John’s thigh.

“I don’t know what to do,” Sherlock said, and he sounded almost insulted that something as trivial as how to cheer his best, and sometimes only, friend up could be so unexpectedly complicated. John patted his head.

“You’re doing it,” John said honestly. “Just. You know. Be here.”

“That seems too simple,” Sherlock said after a thoughtful pause.

John shrugged. “Not everything has to be complicated, Sherlock. Sometimes things just are.”

The next day at work was unexpectedly quiet, even Sherlock going out of his way to not bother John as he moped by the register, looking up at each customer who wandered in. Mrs Hudson finally ordered him to go on break, then joined him with a cup of tea where he sat.

“You had a tiff with your boyfriend?” she said, sipping at her own tea.

John looked up. “How did you know?”

“Oh, I’ve seen that look before,” Mrs Hudson said, waving him off. “I’ve worn it myself a time or two when I was younger.”

“Yeah,” John admitted, toying with a napkin. He tore it into even strips, then tore each strip into tinier squares until they littered the surface. “We might have broken up.”

“Must have been a bad one, then,” Mrs Hudson commented. “I don’t suppose you and Sherlock—”

“No, Mrs Hudson,” John said with fond exasperation. “It’s not going to happen.”

“Pity,” Mrs Hudson said. “But can’t blame an old woman for trying, can you?”

John gave her a small smile at the long-running joke. For such a sweet lady, she took an uncomfortable interest in trying to push her two tenants into some kind of torrid romance, despite John’s insistence that they were just friends.

“So this is about the handsome young man with the cute bum?”

John felt his face flush and his jaw drop. “Mrs Hudson!”

“Please, John, I’m old, not dead,” Mrs Hudson laughed. “What was the fight about?”

“What else?” John rolled his eyes. “He thinks I spend too much time with Sherlock. He doesn’t get that it’s not like—” He sighed in frustration and his eyes darted toward the back, where he knew Sherlock was probably eavesdropping. He lowered his voice. “I’m the only friend Sherlock has, and Greg just doesn’t seem to get that. He thinks he’s just an annoying prat who calls me up because he’s lazy or something, but it’s just.”

He stopped, at a loss for how to explain it, but Mrs Hudson nodded understandingly. “You get a boyfriend and Sherlock panics, thinking you’re going to leave him.”

“Exactly.”

“Well, have you told Greg that?” Mrs Hudson pointed out reasonably.

“No,” John said. People thought it was so dreadfully simple, like all one had to do was talk to the other person and the whole mess would be cleared up like magic. It wasn’t that easy sometimes. “I don’t know how to explain it.”

Mrs Hudson gave him a sympathetic smile. “Well, dear, maybe he’ll come to his senses on his own.”

She gave him a comforting pat on the shoulder as she stood, and John shook off the uncomfortable feeling that she was making fun of him. He sighed and buried his head in his arms.

The week dragged on, neither John nor Greg willing to give in, when Sherlock one day met him outside the door of their flat. He looked uncertain and a tad guilty.

“What did you do this time?” John asked with a sinking feeling of dread.

“Don’t be angry,” Sherlock said, which usually preceded something that would, in fact, make John very angry. “But I did something.”

“I gathered that,” John said irritably. “What is it?”

Sherlock fidgeted, then opened the door of the flat and gestured for John to walk in. He did so cautiously. There on the sofa sat Greg, who smiled wanly at him and gave a little wave.

“Hi.”

John stared at him for a moment. “Excuse me for a moment.” He grabbed his flat mate and hauled him into the hallway, letting the door close behind him.

“What were you thinking?” he demanded.

Sherlock straightened. “I just thought that maybe if I explained some things to him, he would—”

“You just stuck your nose in where it didn’t belong and—” John’s thoughts scattered. “I can’t believe you. No, wait, I can, I completely can. Why on earth did you think this would be a good idea?”

“I overheard you talking with Mrs Hudson,” Sherlock said. His voice never softened or wavered, but John felt a little nauseous anyway at the thought of him overhearing what John had said. “I know you and Greg had that fight about me. I’m not a charity case, you know. I’m perfectly capable of taking care of myself.”

“I can’t,” John ran a hand through his hair and sighed. “Just give us a moment, will you?”

Sherlock nodded, sitting down on the steps. John rolled his eyes. “You can go inside, idiot,” he said fondly.

“I’d rather sit out here,” Sherlock said, perched on the landing.

John stared down at him, then shook his head and left him to it.

Greg was still on the couch where he left, looking more nervous than before. John joined him on the sofa, leaving a decent space between them.

“Hi,” he said again, unsure of how to begin.

“Sherlock told me,” Greg blurted. “I mean, not everything, but enough.”

John stared at him, blinking. “Okay.”

Greg sighed. “I still think he’s a prat,” he said, holding up his hand to forestall any more protests. “But he called me and told me that I needed to make things right because your moping was interfering with his thought processes.”

“I wasn’t moping,” John said defensively.

“Really? Because I was. My sister’s ready to kill me for calling her every night, drunk off my arse,” Greg said with a self-deprecating smile. “That’s not the point though. He didn’t say it, but he wants you to be happy. And I don’t get it. I still think he’s an annoying twat, but… you clearly see something in him. And it wasn’t fair of me to make judgements when I barely know the guy.”

John waited for him to finish.

“The point is,” Greg sighed, “I mean, I’d like to still go out with you. It’s been a lot of fun, and I really like you. And if that means putting up with Sherlock bloody Holmes, then I suppose I’ll just have to get to know him better, right?”

“He’s not that bad,” John found himself saying for a second time.

“Yeah, well, maybe I just need to find that out for myself,” Greg said. He stood and held out his hand, pulling John up. They leaned together in a warm embrace, kissing each other softly. “I’ve missed you.”

“Me too,” John confessed.

The moment was broken when Sherlock stuck his head in and squinted at them. “Are you quite done with the apologies and sentimental declarations?” he asked.

Greg laughed into John’s shoulder, then lifted his head. “Yeah, we’re done.”

“Good, maybe I can finally get some work done,” said Sherlock with a sniff, though he made a beeline for his room.

“Hey, wait,” Greg said, and Sherlock paused, turning around with one eyebrow raised questioningly. “We were wondering if you wanted to join us.”

Sherlock looked honestly perplexed. “Why?”

Greg shrugged. “Thought it’d be a good idea to get to know you better.”

Sherlock turned it over in his head. “Fine. Where are we going?”

John grinned. “I know of this great little pastry shop down the way…”


	6. Missing Scene

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a bit of a scene that didn't really fit in - it's the conversation between Greg and Sherlock.

Greg took another sip of his beer, staring at the telly disconsolately. There was some makeover show on, an annoying woman whipping the crowds into a frenzy as she told some poor chap that his clothes were outdated and made him look ten years older.

“Sorry, mate,” he said in commiseration, toasting the man before downing the last of the bottle. “You look fine to me.”

He stumbled to the fridge to grab another, pausing when he noticed his mobile blinking. He opened it and checked his messages, surprised to see several texts in his inbox from an unknown number. He clicked on the first.

‘You must apologize to John. –SH.’

The cheek of that man, Greg thought with amazement. He deleted it and checked the next one.

‘You’re in the wrong. –SH’

‘Wrong. –SH.’

‘It is interfering with my experiments and must not continue. –SH’.

He deleted them all without looking at the rest, then settled in on the couch. His mobile buzzed again. He ignored it. The phone beeped indignantly, then buzzed again. He steadfastly ignored it. Finally after the seventh time, he called the number.

“Will you bloody well stop texting me?” he said without bothering to wait for Sherlock to say anything.

There was a silence, then, “You need to apologise,” Sherlock’s voice said stiffly.

“It’s none of your business!” Greg shouted angrily.

“Actually, it is,” Sherlock said, somewhat cryptically. “You knew John and I shared a flat before you began dating him. Circumstances haven’t changed, ergo, your anger is irrational.”

Greg closed his eyes. It was like trying to reason with a robot. “I knew you shared a flat with him. I didn’t know you two were joined at the bloody hip.”

There was another long pause on the other end, and Greg actually wondered if the man was inputting data into that remarkable mind of his, waiting for the answer to spit out.

“I don’t understand,” Sherlock said finally.

Greg shook his head. “I’m dating the man, not you,” he explained slowly. “Yet half of our dates, we end up talking about you, and the other half, you ring him nonstop. See the problem?”

“No.”

Of course he didn’t. In the mind of Sherlock Holmes, Sherlock needed something, John liked to help people, therefore it was a perfectly sound assessment that John and Sherlock were perfect for each other. If the man had shown any interest in anybody, and goodness knows he had opportunities, what with that Jim fellow and Molly girl throwing themselves at him during the class they had together, Greg would have suspected him of carrying a torch for John. That was one thing he didn’t have to worry about, at least. It didn’t stop the man from monopolising John’s time.

“Listen, it’s complicated, okay?” Greg said, scrubbing his face with his free hand. He was both too drunk and not drunk enough to be having this conversation.

“Then explain it,” Sherlock said reasonably. “Come over at six o’clock.”

“What? No! I’m not—”

The phone clicked, letting him know the conversation was over.

Greg stared at it, then shook his head. The woman on the telly was still blathering on about what colors to wear and Greg suddenly felt very tired. He tried to look at it from John’s point of view. John was genuinely caring, not too nice that he didn’t occasionally let out a barbed comment, funny, and all in all, there must be something redeemable about Sherlock if John was willing to put up with him. John didn’t seem the type to be bowled over by someone’s intellectual prowess alone. Greg thought guiltily back to smoking with Sally after class, both of them laughing at the freak who regularly corrected the instructor’s mistakes. At the time, it was funny, but he was younger then and now, older if not wiser, he suddenly felt a pang of regret. There was one time when Sherlock had walked past and Sally had muttered ‘freak’ under her breath. Sherlock’s back had stiffened, but he hadn’t said anything as he walked past.

Greg sighed and grabbed his keys, setting off for 221B. He owed it to the man to at least listen to what he had to say.


End file.
